Five alleged gang members get order to stay trial

 

The Court of Appeal halted proceedings after a lawyer was disqualified for asking questions that suggested he could be a potential witness.

PUTRAJAYA: Five men facing charges for being members of an organised crime group named “Kumpulan Viki Naidu” obtained an interim order from the Court of Appeal to stay their trial scheduled to resume next week.

The order was granted after trial judge Su Tiang Joo of the Ipoh High Court disqualified their lawyer Charan Singh from representing them in the case in August

A three-member bench chaired by Hanipah Farikullah allowed the order pending the disposal of an application filed by V Vigneswaran Naidu, D Ganesan, P Velmurugan, D Enthiran and K Ganesen who were represented by Salim Bashir.

In August, Su, a judicial commissioner, removed Charan on the grounds that the lawyer had asked questions that suggested he could be a potential witness.

Su said Charan would be in conflict of interest and in breach of Rule 28 of the Legal Profession (Practice and Etiquette) Rules 1978. The rule states a lawyer cannot appear in a case where he/she is a witness.

DPP Mohd Zain Ibrahim, who appeared for the public prosecutor, told the bench he needed more time to file an affidavit to respond to the application.

The bench, also consisting of Mohamad Zabidin Mohd Diah and Che Mohd Ruzima Ghazali, then stayed the proceedings scheduled from Monday to Wednesday.

Ten men, including the five, are facing charges which carry a maximum 20-year jail term. Initially, eight of them were denied bail as it was a security offence.

However Su granted the eight bail of RM30,000 for each man, in two sureties, and ordered that they be fitted with an electronic monitoring device.

They were also ordered to surrender their passports to the court and are prohibited from communicating with any of the witnesses until the disposal of the trial. - FMT